For those who prefer the old system font, now it’s easy to get it in Ubuntu 23.10 via a new package!
Since Ubuntu 23.04, Ubuntu takes use a new slim font for the text in system menus, documents, and app windows.
Some users do NOT like the change, because the new font is thin and hard to focus on. And, I’ve written about how to get the previous font back in Ubuntu 23.04.
Now, Ubuntu 23.10 includes a new package fonts-ubuntu-classic in system repository. Make it easy to do the job even without a system restart.
Install the Classic Font in Ubuntu 23.10
To install the font, simply press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open terminal.
When terminal opens, run command:
sudo apt install fonts-ubuntu-classic
Run sudo apt update to update package cache if it says package not found.
After installation, your system font change without restart! For opened app windows, you need to close and re-open them. For ‘Files’, just run nautilus -q to reload.
(Optional) Install ‘fonts-ubuntu-console’
The package above does not install the old font for the command console.
For choice, you may download the package for Ubuntu 22.04:
Since Ubuntu 23.04 Lunar Lobster, the default system fonts for the texts in system menus, documents, and app windows have been changed.
The new font is slim. And, I’ve written a tutorial about how to try it out in Ubuntu 22.04 and 20.04. If you prefer the old one, here’s how to revert it back in Ubuntu 24.04 LTS.
Compare to Ubuntu 23.04/23.10, the new font in Ubuntu 24.04 looks better now in my opinion. Because, the default fonts have been changed:
from ‘Ubuntu Regular‘ to ‘Ubuntu Sans‘ for interface text.
from ‘Ubuntu Mono Regular‘ to ‘Ubuntu Sans Mono‘ for monospace text.
Default fonts changed in Ubuntu 24.04
Install old Ubuntu Fonts in Ubuntu 24.04
1. Install the classic font
Since Ubuntu 23.10, a new package fonts-ubuntu-classic is available in system repository for those who prefer the classic font.
To install the package, press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open up a terminal window. Then, run command:
sudo apt install fonts-ubuntu-classic
You may run sudo apt update to refresh system package cache first if the command above somehow does not work for you.
After installing the classic fonts, text in terminal may become un-readable. In the case, just log out and back in.
2. Download & install classic font for Console (Optional)
The classic font for console (terminal) so far is NOT available in Ubuntu 24.04 repository. For choice, you may manually download and install the package for Ubuntu 22.04.
To do so, launch a terminal window (Ctrl+Alt+T), and download the classic font for console package via command:
Option 1: Use Gnome Tweaks to apply classic fonts:
After installed the classic fonts, it won’t apply automatically, because the default font names have changed as mentioned.
To switch back the old ones, first search for and install GNOME Tweaks from App Center.
Next, launch Gnome Tweaks, and in the first “Fonts” tab:
Select Ubuntu Regular as Interface Text font. It will be displayed as ‘Ubuntu’ after selection.
And select Ubuntu Mono Regular for Monospace Text, if you also installed the classic font for console.
Option 2: use Linux commands to apply the classic fonts
For those who are OK with Linux commands, open up a terminal window (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run the commands below one by one instead:
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.interface font-name "Ubuntu 11"
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.interface monospace-font-name "Ubuntu Mono 13"
Lock & Prevent updating to new fonts
To prevent your system from automatically updating to the new fonts, you have to lock the old fonts packages that were just installed via the previous step.
Thanks to @Alex Farran, lock package version via Synaptic package manager only prevents itself and ‘Software Updater’ from upgrading the package. However, apt command and may be other tools can still upgrade the fonts. So, the best choice can be running the command below in terminal:
sudo apt-mark hold fonts-ubuntu fonts-ubuntu-console
For the graphical way (NOT work for apt), first open App Center, search for and install Synatic Package Manager.
Then launch “Synaptic”, click “Search” and search “fonts-ubuntu“. Finally, do:
Press and hold Ctrl then highlight both “fonts-ubuntu” and “fonts-ubuntu-console” packages.
Go to menu “Package -> Lock Version”.
How to go back the new Ubuntu Fonts
First, open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run command to unlock the font packages:
The Ubuntu design team is working on new Ubuntu fonts and proposes to use as default in the upcoming Ubuntu 23.04.
For testing purpose, the team posted the .deb packages for the new fonts in this thread. User can try it out by installing in all current Ubuntu releases and report any issue in this page.
I’ve tried out the new fonts in Ubuntu 22.04 LTS. The text in system menu and application window becomes a bit thin and compact than before.
And, the document text in text editor looks enlarged, that I even doubted if the font size was changed mistakenly.
How to Install the New Fonts
First, press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open a terminal window. When it opens, run single command below to download the 2 font packages:
You can then remove the 2 packages in user home folder. And restart computer to apply changes after installation.
How to Restore original fonts
The stock fonts package version varies on different Ubuntu editions, so I would recommend to first install Synaptic package manager in Ubuntu Software.
Then, open “Synaptic” and do:
Search and highlight “fonts-ubuntu” package.
Go to menu “Package -> Force Version”.
Select the old stock version from pop-up dialog, then click “Force Version” button.
Finally, click “Apply”.
Also, do the previous steps one by one for “fonts-ubuntu-console” package.
This simple tutorial shows how to fix the launching issue for TypeCatcher in Ubuntu 22.04 or other Linux with Python 3.9 & higher.
TypeCatcher is a simple GTK application to download and install Google webfonts for off-line use. The app is available to install in Ubuntu Software for all current Ubuntu releases. However, it does not launch in Ubuntu since 21.10.
TypeCatcher, download & install Google Fonts
When trying to launch it from command line, it outputs something like this:
Traceback (most recent call last):
File “/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/typecatcher_lib/Application.py”, line 30, in on_activate
self.window = TypeCatcherWindow.TypeCatcherWindow()
File “/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/typecatcher_lib/Window.py”, line 47, in __new__
builder = get_builder(‘TypeCatcherWindow’)
File “/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/typecatcher_lib/helpers.py”, line 44, in get_builder
builder.add_from_file(ui_filename)
File “/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/typecatcher_lib/Builder.py”, line 86, in add_from_file
ele_widgets = tree.getiterator(“object”)
AttributeError: ‘ElementTree’ object has no attribute ‘getiterator’
The issue is because of the removal of getiterator() methods from xml.etree.ElementTree module in Python 3.9, which was deprecated since Python 3.2.
As the announcement indicates, simply use iter() method instead will fix the issue.
Methods getchildren() and getiterator() of classes ElementTree and Element in the ElementTree module have been removed. They were deprecated in Python 3.2. Use iter(x) or list(x) instead of x.getchildren() and x.iter() or list(x.iter()) instead of x.getiterator().
1. First, search for and open a terminal window from either start menu or ‘Activities’ overview depends on your desktop environment.
2. When terminal opens, run command to edit the file that contains the ‘getiterator()’ method (see the first screenshot). In the case, it’s “/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/typecatcher_lib/Builder.py”.
replace gedit to your favorite text editor, or use nano command line editor that works in most Linux.
3. When files opens, find out and replace tree.getiterator with tree.iter.
For Gedit text editor, just go to menu, click open ‘Find and Replace’ dialog. Finally, insert tree.getiterator as ‘Find’, and ‘tree.iter‘ as ‘Replace with’, then click on ‘Replace All’ button.
For nano text editor, press Alt+R when the file opens in terminal window. Then type tree.getiterator when it indicates ‘Search (to replace)’, hit Enter, and insert tree.iter when prompts ‘Replace with’. Finally, hit Enter and type y. Or, just use arrow keys to find and replace the keyword (there are 2) manually. And, press Ctrl+x, type y, and hit Enter to save changes.
After saving the file, try to launch it either from ‘Activities’ overview or command line, and enjoy!
FreeType, a popular font rendering engine, has reached the 2.7 release with a new default mode for bytecode hinting: Subpixel hinting.
In case you are already using subpixel hinting (for example, by using the ‘Infinality patches’ as provided by some GNU/Linux or BSD distributions, or directly from bohoomil.com), be noted that the new mode might provide subtle differences; the code was simplified to make it much faster. If you are used to the old full-pixel hinting, you will see many rendering changes. If you really dislike them, you can disable them at compile time or using the new FREETYPE_PROPERTIES environment variable.
The new release also has improvements to its smooth rasterizer to make it about 20% faster, fixes to fuzzer, handling of raw CID fonts, and various other bug fixes and improvements. See details at FreeType.org.
Install FreeType 2.7 in Ubuntu 16.04:
The Ubuntu 16.04 build has been made into PPA, available for install/upgrade by following the steps below:
1. Open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run command to add the PPA repository:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:no1wantdthisname/ppa
Type in your password (no visual feedback) when it asks and hit Enter.
2. To upgrade from a previous release, just launch Software Updater and you’ll see the new release available in the update list:
Or run the commands below to install or upgrade it from command line:
sudo apt update && sudo apt install libfreetype6
Undo:
Simply purge the PPA via ppa-purge will downgrade FreeType to the stock version in Ubuntu 16.04 repository:
Want to install Microsoft fonts, Google web fonts for off-line use, or you just found a favorite font on the web and want to install it in Ubuntu?
Well here’s how to install the font files (.ttf, .ttc) downloaded from web, Google fonts page, or copied from your Windows OS.
Here are 4 font files shown in the picture above. In the steps below I’ll show you how to install and use it in Ubuntu Desktop.
Option 1: Install Fonts for current user only
If you want to install the fonts for current user use only, then simply open up a “Files” (file manager) window, press Ctrl+H to show hidden folder, and navigate to .local/share/fonts (create fonts sub-folder if not exist).
Next, drag’n’drop your font files into that directory, or a sub-folder of that directory.
Finally, press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open terminal, and run command to refresh the cache:
sudo fc-cache -fv
Next, your system configuration tool can find and allow you to apply the fonts
Option 2: Manually install Fonts to system wide use
To install fonts for all users use, do the following steps one by one instead.
1. Launch Terminal from start menu, or by pressing Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard:
When it opens, paste following commands and run one by one.
2. In Ubuntu Linux, font files are installed to /usr/local/share/fonts or /usr/share/fonts. The former directory is recommended in this case for manual installation.
First create a sub folder in the font directory, ms_fonts, as example:
sudo mkdir /usr/local/share/fonts/ms_fonts
Type in your password when it asks (no visual feedback) and hit Enter.
3. Move all font files from your Downloads directory to the new created folder:
